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In recent months, Vietnam has fast emerged as one of the most favored destinations for poker in Asia. With premier brands like the Asian Poker Tour (APT) already enjoying a prominent presence in the country, it was only expected that the World Poker Tour (WPT) would follow suit. After an immensely successful debut last year (Sept 26-Oct 4), the WPT Vietnam is back at the Pro Poker Club in Ho Chi Minh City with its second edition.
Action picked up on the second day of the series where 18 Day 1 survivors returned to the felts in Event #2: Turbo Deepstack. End of play, Nguyen Duc Thanh outlasted them all to win and title and VND 16,51,70,000 (₹4.92 Lakhs) in prize money. Thanh defeated Tan Wah Meng heads-up, the latter banking VND 9,98,70,000 (₹2.97 Lakhs).
Players have started flying in before the weekend, and many more are expected to arrive in time for the Main Event. Benefitting from this, the second starting flight of the Kickoff attracted 121 entries, making for a 195-strong field in the event so far. Only 15 could make it to Day 2, with Pavil Lubov topping them all with a stack of 5,18,000. India’s Pavan Jain (17,000) has also made it to Day 2 from the flight.
Two more starting flights of the Main Event are on tap today, and the event looks well on track to cross its VND 3 Billion (₹89.54 Lakhs) guarantee.
The third event on the schedule, i.e., Turbo Deepstack opened on March 15. The tournament attracted a total of 66 entries, and field size was whittled down to the final three players on Day 1, namely Dinh Long (4,80,000), Simon Maathonnet (4,70,000), and Vincent Chauve (3,10,000), with Patrick Pun finishing in fourth place. The final results of the event were yet to be declared at the time of publishing this report.
Kickoff- Day 1B Recap
With a buy-in of VND 10,000,000 (₹29,801), the WPT Vietnam Kickoff offers an attractive prize pool guarantee of VND 3 Billion GTD (₹89.54 Lakhs).
After a slow start of Day 1A that mustered only 74 entries, the numbers soared on Day 1B as a total of 121 entries registered for the event, taking the overall field size to 195 entries.
As is the format of the event play once again continued till all the remaining players were in the money. Only 15 finalists could qualify for Day 2, all of them in the money, and with this, the list of survivors progressing to Day 2 has increased to 24.
While Pavil Lubov leads the Day 1B survivors with a stack of 5,18,000, South Korea’s Eunho Kwon (4,06,000) is the next big stack with 4,06,000, and Pasi Heinanen (3,37,000) rounds out the top three stacks.
Kwon is a known name in the Asian circuit and a seasoned one at that. In the 2018 APL Road Series Vol.3, Kwon took down the High Rollers for VND 699,250,000 (₹21,16,323).
Also in contention is Rex Clinkscales (1,29,000). WPT is familiar territory for the American pro who boasts of total live earnings of $1.5 Million. He was crowned the WPTDeepstacks Player of the Year in 2017 when he became the first two-time champion in WPT DeepStacks history. Clinkscales travels a lot for poker and comes in fresh from an outing at WSOPC Las Vegas where he picked up two scores. His biggest cash this year came through his 45th place finish at the 2019 PokerStars Caribbean Adventure (PCA) $10,300 NLHE Main Event.
Day 1B ITM Players
Nguyen Duc Thanh Wins Event #2 – Deepstack 2-Day
The VND 6,600,000 (₹19,669) buy-in Event #2: Deepstack 2-Day kicked off on March 15 with 88 entries.
The field whittled down to 18 runners when Day 2 began and dominating the felts was Nguyen Duc Thanh who had to face Tan Wah Meng heads-up. Thanh defeated Meng to win the event along with a payday of VND 16,51,70,000 (₹4,92,234). Meng meanwhile, collected VND 9,98,70,000 (₹2.97 Lakhs) for his runner-up finish.
The bubble burst sometime on Day 2, as only the top 11 players took home a share of the prize pool with a min-cash worth VND 1,43,40,000 (₹42,735).
The first player to be eliminated in the money was Mathonwet Simon (11th for VND 1,43,40,000), while Nong Mitchel (10th for VND 1,53,60,000) bubbled the nine-handed final table.
Final Table Results (VND)
The plan for today includes the two remaining starting flights of WPT Vietnam Kickoff. The fourth and final flight will be a turbo flight. Sunday promises to be a relatively busier as Day 2 of the Kickoff event is slated to run alongside the Bounty 2-Day event and the WPT Vietnam Super High Roller.
Content & Images Courtesy: Danny McDonagh & World Poker Tour
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